Tuesday, March 31, 2015

With calls mounting for a revision of the proposed Bangsamoro
Basic Law (BBL), the labor group Partido Manggagawa (PM) also called for
amending the draft so that workers rights are better protected. “Along with our
support for peace rather than war in Mindanao,
we demand that the rights of workers, whether Moro, Christian or indigenous, in
the Bangsamoro territory be respected and enhanced, and that these freedoms
must be codified in the BBL,” asserted Renato Magtubo, PM national chair.

He clarified that “Specifically we call for amending the draft
provision in Article IX, Section 9 stating that ‘The Bangsamoro government shall
guarantee all the fundamental rights of all workers to self-organization, collective
bargaining and negotiations, and peaceful concerted activities, including the
right to strike, in accordance with law to be passed by Parliament.’ Making labor
rights subject to laws to be enacted by the Bangsamoro parliament opens a
loophole to diminish workers’ freedoms. This is a real threat since we know there
is intense lobby from employers groups to degrade labor rights, among them security
of tenure so as to promote contractualization in the Bangsamoro territory.”

PM is aware that foreign capital such as American and
Malaysian investors are partnering with Filipino business for prospects in
mining exploration and agricultural plantations in the Bangsamoro territory. “Capitalists,
whether foreign or domestic, should not monopolize the benefits of the peace
dividend on the backs of sacrificing the rights of workers, whether Moro,
Christian or indigenous,” argued Magtubo.

PM also added its support for calls from indigenous groups
in the proposed Bangsamoro territory for the recognition of the rights of the Lumad
and the full inclusion of provisions of the Indigenous People’s Rights Act into
the BBL. Indigenous peoples such as the Teduray, Lambangian, Dulangan-Manobo
and Erumanen ne Menuvu live in the areas to be absorbed in the Bangsamoro.

Amidst the outcry over the Mamasapano incident, PM joined other
groups in appealing for negotiating a peace settlement with the Moro Islamic
Liberation Front (MILF) and opposed cries for all-out war. “Peace and
development in Mindanao is in the interest of the
working class and indigenous peoples. But social justice must accompany social
progress thus our call for protecting workers and indigenous rights in the
Bangsamoro,” Magtubo elaborated.

Monday, March 23, 2015

With women’s month about to end, the Inter-Call Center
Association of Workers (ICCAW) called on the BPO industry to provide “women-friendly
benefits in furtherance of work-life balance.” Rhejay Eusebio, ICCAW-NCR
spokesperson, asserted that “BPO jobs are characterized by monotonous tasks,
intense work and strict metrics. The competitive culture promoted in the BPO
industry has led to work-life imbalance. This imbalance disproportionately
impacts women employees who are breadwinners and with children.”

Specifically the group is asking BPO companies to provide
child care facilities where employees can leave their children while at work.
Also ICCAW is demanding that the industry take the lead in providing 120 days
of pregnancy leave for women workers.

“My personal experience as a BPO worker for several years shows
how family life is frequently sacrificed at the altar of work productivity,”
Eusebio elaborated. She has a pending case at the National Labor Relations
Commission for illegal dismissal. Eusebio is alleging she was fired without valid
cause and due process after taking an emergency leave to take care of her sick
daughter.

She insisted that “For sure, BPO companies will argue that
these are costly benefits to provide. Yet BPO’s can very well afford these
measures since it is a dollar-earning industry. BPO’s do not deserve to be
called a sunshine industry if it cannot provide for above-average working
conditions and labor standards.”

The BPO industry earns around USD 20 billion or almost PhP 1
trillion in revenues. Also it is estimated that there are more than a million
BPO workers in the country. A survey in 2010 by the Bureau of Labor and
Employment Statistics found that some 54% of BPO workers are women. “I believe
that many of these women BPO workers are either breadwinners for their families
or with children to take care of. Thus women-friendly benefits are an
imperative for the BPO industry,” Eusebio emphasized.

ICCAW was founded in Cebu in
late 2012 as a result of the fight of workers of Direct Access, a call center
that unceremoniously shutdown leaving its 600 employees without jobs and with
unpaid wages and benefits. It has since then expanded its membership nationwide
even as it sits as the labor representative in the CebuCity
tripartite body on the ICT industry.

ICCAW seeks to be an industry-wide organization for
employees in the call center and business process outsourcing sector (BPO), and
be a voice for industry workers’ concerns, grievances, demands and interests. Among
ICCAW’s platform is the call for industry-wide
standards for wages, benefits and entitlements that must be well above the
minimum mandated by law and commensurate to the profitable dollar-earning
nature of the call center industry.

Thursday, March 19, 2015

The militant Partido Manggagawa belittled the minimum wage
hike for workers in the National Capital Region (NCR) as “loose change that
cannot even cover the fare hike for MRT and LRT.” The NCR Regional Tripartite Wages
and Productivity Board announced a P15 pay increase for some 600,000 minimum
wage earners in NCR.

Renato Magtubo, PM national chair, asserted that “How can
inclusive growth be true and of what use is the Philippine economy being the star
performer in Asia, when all that workers can
receive as their added share in the fruits of their labor is a measly P15? With
MRT fares increased from P15 to P28, a minimum wage earner riding to and from
work is worse off than before even with the wage hike. And electricity bills
are due to balloon in the coming days.”

Magtubo cited a study which reveals that 70% of MRT and LRT
riders are people who earn less than the minimum wage. He said that he expected
labor groups attending a meeting tomorrow of the Tripartite Executive Committee
of the National Tripartite Industrial Peace Council to register their negative
sentiments on the measly pay increase.

“With their sorry track record of propping up the cheap
labor policy, the regional wage boards deserve to be abolished,” Magtubo declared.
PM is advocating the abolition of the wage boards and its replacement by a
National Wage Commission. The mandate of the Wage Commission will be to fix wages
based on the single criterion of cost of living.

“Despite the huge gap between the present minimum
wage and the current cost of living, the Wage Commission can achieve equalizing
the two by a host of mechanisms among which are direct wage increases, tax
exemptions, price discounts at social security subsidies for workers,” Magtubo
explained.

Wednesday, March 18, 2015

There is no principle of chain of command in the privatized and deregulated power industry yet President Aquino, acting as the country’s Chief Executive, should be blamed for his failure to address the country's decade-old problem of escalating rates and diminishing supply.

The labor group, Partido Manggagawa (PM), expressed this indignation in reaction to the impending spikes in power rates beginning this month due to the shutdown of the Malampaya gas platform, the expected forced outages (FO) during summer, and the implementation of a palliative yet costly emergency measure called the Interruptible Load Program.

“We could have evaded the recurrence of another power crisis had the Aquino government, upon assumption to power in 2010, formulated a ‘war plan’ to address the twin crisis of high cost of power and energy security,” said PM spokesman Wilson Fortaleza.

Fortaleza noted that as early as 2011, the 19th Status Report on EPIRA Implementation already raised the red flag signaling the recurrence of energy crisis as the private sector failed to install additional capacity to the national grid.

Also as early as 2008, Fortaleza added, the Joint Congressional Power Committee (JPCP) then headed by Sen. Miriam Defensor-Santiago has declared EPIRA as a failure. All Congressional hearings on this issue up to this time has also led to the same conclusion. Yet the response is ‘business as usual’.

Fortaleza added that labor groups under the Nagkaisa coalition has been pressing the Aquino government to address the crisis of high cost of power by removing the indexation of natural gas to international oil and geothermal steam to international coal; the scrapping of Performance Based Rate methodology; removal of power from VAT coverage; and reforming the Energy Regulatory Commission (ERC), among others.

“The crisis of escalating rates and unreliable supply is a lingering crisis that needed a battle plan where consumers will see themselves as winners. What the government has on hand, however, is an old menu where consumers, whom the Chief Executive declared as his bosses, were treated as foot soldiers assigned to do the ultimate sacrifice,” said Fortaleza.

The ILP

The implementation of the Interruptible Load Program (ILP) to address the power emergency is a clear manifestation on how consumers are being penalized by assuming the responsibility of footing the bill of expensive ILP power.

Fortaleza said that under ILP guidelines, the incremental cost of de-loading from the system during red alerts shall be borne by consumers. This is to incentivize industries with embedded generators to participate in the program. The incremental cost has already been pre-determined such as the fuel rate and maintenance cost.

“The ILP is merely a demand-side management strategy. It doesn’t solve the power crisis. But why are consumers going to be penalized even temporarily when Henry Sy switch on his generator for own use?” lamented Fortaleza.

Fortaleza argued that poor families who use kerosene for light and cooking do not get subsidy from government, so why subsidize ILP players when their generators are for own use to run their business that earns profit even during crises?

He added that it is the ILP players who should bear the sacrifice since they have the capacity and the wealth to burn during crises. The ILP players, he added, are also the big players in the power industry such as Henry Sy (NGCP), John Gokongwei (Meralco), and the Ayalas and Aboitizes, to name a few.

“They are the richest Filipinos in the latest list of Forbes Magazine. They have a combined net worth of $73 billion and one of the sources of their fortunes is the country’s very lucrative power industry,” concluded Fortaleza.

Tuesday, March 17, 2015

Workers of a Korean-owned metal factory in the Cavite economic zone, the
biggest in the country, are restive once more because of a series of dismissals
and suspensions of union members. The Tae Sung Employees Association, the labor
union at Tae Sung Philippines Co. Inc., filed a notice of strike last Friday as
it alleged unfair labor practices of the management.

In the three weeks since the settlement of a previous strike
by the Tae Sung union, management has dismissed two union members and suspended
six more, including one union officer. The Tae Sung union is alleging that the
terminations and suspensions of active unionists are retaliatory acts and thus
a violation of a settlement agreement that no such actions should be
undertaken.

The National Conciliation and Mediation Board of Region IV-A
has called for a meeting tomorrow between union and management in a bid to
settle the new labor dispute. Just last February the Tae Sung workers launched
a two-day strike over a deadlock in collective bargaining negotiations that has
lasted for six months without an agreement between the union and management.
The strike was settled with workers winning a wage hike and added benefits.

The Tae Sung union is citing the case of three workers in
the spray department who were all charged with a case for eating in the
production area. Two of them, who are active union members, were fired as a
result but the third worker, who scabbed during the February strike, was given
a “slap in the wrist” of just a five-day suspension.

The union is arguing that minor infractions by workers have
been meted the maximum of 30-day suspensions thus constituting discriminatory
acts. A 30-day long suspension means the loss of a month’s wage for the
concerned workers.

Further, the union is complaining that management has
delayed by a month the signing of the collective bargaining agreement even
though the settlement provided it shall be finished in just one week.

The Partido Manggagawa warned of protests to support the
embattled Tae Sung workers in case there is no breakthrough in the mediation
meeting tomorrow. The union is also planning to hold a strike vote among its
members.

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Our dream is a world that gives due importance to the role of the working class and respects the dignity of labor. A social order where the working men and women of the world live together in peace, harmony and progress.Our aspirations lie in the emancipation of labor. A government that is truly of the workers, by the workers and for the workers.

Our hopes rest in a future where social progress thrives not for the benefit of a few people but for the development and richness of the entire humankind. A society that is free from the chains of wage slavery and where oppression does not exist.

Our Mission

Forge the unity of the workers into an independent working class party to organize them as a potent political force in social transformation towards the advancement and protection of labor from the scourge of globalization, establishment of a genuine workers’ government and the emancipation of the working class from capitalist exploitation and wage slavery.

Workers Unite!

The working class is the most important class in society. But, labor will only be a force to reckon with at a time when labor assumes the responsibility of leading the struggle to a decent living - free from exploitation of the propertied elite.

The time has come to rally every underprivileged sector of the society, to take the bull by the head and confront the issues of today. The working class must take an active role in every political exercise presented. The backbone of the independent party must be comprised of the working class with the other marginalized sectors in solidarity.

We must organize politically.

This is our own challenge and we must vow not to shirk from it.

Our future is in our hands, in our unity, in our struggle, in our party.